The shimmer across the rooftops was hard to look at directly, like heat waves seen through cracked glass. Tanya crouched by one of the ward junctions, her breath fogging in the chill, tracing a finger just shy of the glowing lines.

Tanya looked over to Mrs Eceer, finally giving in to all of the questions she'd had since she first heard about this new defence system. "So we don't have to worry about some stray beastie just wanderin' in and setting it all off?" she asked.

Mrs Eceer shook her head. "Not unless it meets the conditions. It's layered." She laughed bitterly. It was the laugh of someone who had spent hours hitting their head against a brick wall, solving too many problems. "It was—" she rubbed her hands down her face. "The stories I could tell of the issues with this monstrosity."

Tanya half-grinned, half-grimaced. "Boy, do I know."

Assistant floated beside them, holding up its paper. We shood show it off. Lets find a tester!

"Don't rush," Mrs Eceer said, folding her arms. "The circuit is most useful when you understand what it's checking for."

Tanya stood up, brushing dust from her knees. "So tell me, yeah? Properly. You said it works like a brain."

"A brain made of wires and wards," Eceer said. "It starts with input—detectors. That's what these outer wards do." She gestured across the rooftops where thin, spiralling etchings ran into the storm drains and vent hoods.

"They're mana-sensitive?" Tanya asked, curious now. "Like pressure plates, but magic?"

The corner of Mrs Eceer's mouth twitched. "Exactly. There are three main types. Movement runes—basic. Vibration, pressure, and kinetic. That's the first port of call, but if we only had that it would go off for anything moving. I had to study monsters deeply to see how to separate them from people."

Eceer shielded her eyes briefly from the angled sun, adjusting her footing before stepping onto a narrower roof segment. She pointed at a rune across the street.

"That created signature runes. They scan for a compound that radiates off the monsters. It seems to be a low-level radiation. I created my own magical form of a Geiger counter. I was very lucky to have some of my old physics books still."

Eceer paused near the roof's edge, hands clasped behind her back, gaze scanning across the street.

"Finally, we have light-break wards—very clever things. You can't see any from here. They track visual distortion. Shadows out of place. That one's Assistant's contribution. I believe it got the idea from your stealth cape. That section isn't quite complete yet. We came across some difficulties with working out exactly what allows for Concentration to bypass any kind of invisibility."

Assistant beamed, spinning midair, then lowering to the floor for a proud scribble. I herd you menchun the idia of less notisable and thought we cood do the opposit.

Tanya blinked as she raced to keep up with all of these new concepts. Each question was replaced almost instantly with another. "So all that's just to spot somethin'?"

"Detect it, yes. But spotting alone isn't enough. You need rules."

They began walking along the rooftops, their boots thudding against concrete as they moved between chimneys and rusted antennas. From here, the circuit pattern became clearer. Wards twisted at key points, anchored into broken skylights and rooftop railings, glowing like fireflies in glass.

Mrs Eceer stopped beside one node—a junction that looked more complex than the others. Etched metal panels slotted into place like puzzle pieces, with thin copper lines joining the runes like wires.

"This is a logic gate."

Tanya leaned closer. "Like the electronics thing?"

"Yes. The magic flows through conditionally. If A and B happen, then it continues. This one is an AND gate. If movement and aura are detected and converted to a positive reading, it triggers the next sequence. If only one? It stalls."

"That's clever." Tanya leant in closer. "Means you get fewer false alarms, yeah?"

"Exactly. You can combine these—AND, OR, NOT—to make decision branches. That one over there," she said, pointing to a flat disc set into the side of a vent, "is a NOT rune. If the conversion sensors do not pick up enough for a positive reading of the binary rune, then the energy circles through there instead.'

"Right," Tanya said, turning slowly to take it all in. "So how many of these things are runnin' right now?"

"Six active logic trees. About thirty passive nodes feeding in. I have already prepared mana stabilisers in the anchor points. They absorb excess mana from the trap, so it can not trigger itself by its own excess mana. We're standing in one."

Tanya looked down. The rooftop under her was carved in that same spiralling pattern, nested triangles embedded in the gravel like fossilised geometry. She hadn't even noticed.

Tanya's mouth opened and closed. She couldn't quite believe her eyes. "You built all this?"

"Not quite." Mrs Eceer smiled. "Technically, it isn't live yet. I was actually hoping to talk to you about that." They began making their way back towards the ladder.

"Oh yeah?" Tanya asked. She realised. "Oh man, you mean the achievement, don't ya?"

Tanya pulled it up.

• • •

The Enemy of My Enemy

They were your enemy—kind of—but in the heat of the moment, you risked your life to save them anyway. Now, like it or not, your powers just seem to work better together.

Whilst allies, your powers have a 25% Synergy Bonus whilst directly helping the other.

• • •

Tanya whistled. "That 25% just keeps feelin' more and more powerful as we level, doesn't it?" She looked back at Mrs Eceer, whose eyes were skimming left to right at her own Interface. "So what's left for me to do?"

Unauthorized usage: this tale is on Amazon without the author's consent. Report any sightings.

"As of now, it is powered only by my Concentration. It takes extra to store it in the system I've created in the gutters—"

"There's a whole mana storage system in the gutters?!" Tanya shook her head with a huge grin.

Mrs Eceer smiled. "Yes, keep up."

Tanya snorted.

"I want to find ways for others to power it; otherwise, it would use the majority of my energy, and more than I have during any significant attack. That is where you come in."

Tanya nodded slowly. "You want to find a way for others to take over the load too?"

"Precisely."

Tanya grabbed the top of the ladder, spinning herself onto it and staring at Mrs Eceer from the top. "Well, if you want my help, then I'm gonna need to understand this thing a hell of a lot better."

Most of their early conversation had revolved around tattoos, it felt like the obvious choice, especially with Tanya's new Ability to transfer tattoos over. She could have some sort of magic connecting them to the grid that drew energy as soon as it was summoned.

The big issue with that had been commitment and limitation. Tanya wasn't able to transfer tattoos off of people, which made keeping a tattoo permanently both high cost for Tanya, but also a huge commitment for someone else. They'd basically only get Olena, Boris, and Ishita, and ideally, linking in powering this as part of a cost to customers would allow it to run for far longer with less stress, assuming the parlour was a success.

That led to a lot of skimming of Mrs Eceer's notes as they slouched on the sofa with endless cups of cooling tea.

"So what even fuckin' links us to our magic?" Tanya said, flopping backwards with a groan.

"That is the question," Mrs Eceer said, leaning back too but far more calmly.

Tanya hoiked up her legs onto the arm and swung herself around so her boots were on the top of the sofa and her head was dangling down.

Mrs Eceer raised an eyebrow.

"Blood's supposed to help you think, innit?"

She settled down further, feeling her hair brushing onto the boards.

They both sat there, staring into the room.

"You know," Tanya began, slowly. "My tattoos kinda do that, don't they?"

"Hm?" Mrs Eceer asked.

Tanya flipped herself back the right way, feeling the rush of blood leave her head and the spin of the room. She steadied herself on the armrest and crossed her legs. "I have magic, but by doin' a tattoo I'm givin' someone else control over that part of my magic."

Mrs Eceer nodded. "Right."

Tanya drummed her fingers against her arm. "So you just gotta find a way of making something that you can give to them temporarily, and whilst they have it, it's only theirs."

"So it'd either have to be disposable in some way, or then transfer back like your new Ability then?" Mrs Eceer mused.

"Yeah…" Tanya said. The thought solidified. "Yeah—yeah, actually. Exactly."

The two of them devolved into more and more hairbrained theories as the night made their eyes heavy and their brains even more wired.

It took a few hours, but they finally had a prototype.

The node would be detachable, to allow it to be taken by someone. It also worked with the battery idea that Mrs Eceer had in mind for this underground mana storage originally. The person would then need to concentrate on the device before them for a length of time to drain it. Then they could put it back, and by becoming one with the system again, it would automatically return to Mrs Eceer's magic as hers was dominant in the system. It would be very inefficient with time, but buzzed by lack of sleep and after so much time working on this concept, they were both thrilled.

They'd cleared a space on the rooftop by mid-morning, a patch of gravel swept aside and marked with faint chalk runes and twisted bits of copper. The sky above was grey but bright, the kind of light that flattens shadows and softens edges.

"This is the first time I've stayed up all night since I got my Class," Mrs Eceer admitted.

"And before then?"

"The start of the millennium," Mrs Eceer replied, staring into space for a moment.

Tanya laughed, then realised she wasn't joking.

"How's it feel?"

"Exhausting," Mrs Eceer replied, but she was smiling.

Tanya crouched to hold the node steady while Mrs Eceer tightened the final connection: the repurposed fruitbowl slotted into the heart of the etched structure like a keystone. It clicked with a sound like flint.

Then the rooftop fell still.

The air hummed—just slightly. A tremble, not quite sound, passed through Tanya's boots and into her bones. One by one, the lines spread outward, veins of faint blue crawling across the concrete, jumping across broken vents and rusted gutters, blooming out like a nervous system made of glass and wire.

It was slower than she expected—not explosive, not dramatic.

It was beautiful in its quiet.

Every rooftop in sight began to thrum. First one, then another. The etched wards—some hidden in gutters, others scratched into satellite dishes or strung along telephone wires—came to life. They lit not with a burst but with a pulse.

A heartbeat.

Each light carried the same rhythm, like they were syncing to one another across the block. The city around them, broken and overgrown and jagged, blurred behind it all. In the wash of mana, even the sharp outlines of shattered windows and metal ruins looked softer, folded into something purposeful.

Then, just as slowly, the lights receded.

They sank beneath the surface. Etchings vanished into slate and brick. Only the faintest shimmer remained—like heat haze, or breath on glass. She could still feel it though. Tanya closed her eyes for a moment and could swear she felt the wards brushing against her skin, like a net unfurling across her back.

She took a long breath. Assistant floated silently nearby.

When she opened her eyes, the streets below felt different. Tanya felt like she was tensed ready for something, and she had no idea why.

Then the images hit.

Not memories—ink lines. A tattoo. Whole and perfect and there.

The road twisted into threadwork and negative space, shopfronts stacked like panels in a half-sleeve. Borders set themselves in place without her permission—dotwork for the butcher, clean black line for the bakery. The kebab shop gleamed in oil-slick shimmer, already demanding a gradient. A compass bloomed across the corner. Symbols flared sharply in the backs of her eyes: trap runes and barrier nodes stitched into the guttering, humming with Mrs Eceer's precision.

A weight hit her chest like a breath she forgot to take. Her fingers twitched, already looking for a machine. It wasn't a choice. It was here, full-formed, like it had been growing under her skin and had just now decided to be born.

Tanya exhaled. "Oh, fuck me," she said softly. She stood up so fast her boots scraped on the gravel. "I need me tattoo gun. Now."

Mrs Eceer blinked. "You've barely—"

"No, no, it's— I see it," Tanya said, her voice garbled as she tapped her temple. "It's all here. Like someone stuck a bloody projector behind my eyes."

Mrs Eceer stared at her, slack-jawed, like Tanya had lost her mind.

Tanya spun on the spot, already heading for the ladder back to the building. She couldn't tell if they were following or not.

The shop was still dark inside, shuttered for the morning, the smell of metal ink and ozone still clinging to the walls from Tanya's last spell. She barely noticed.

She shoved aside an old sketchpad and cleared her workstation with one arm. Her gear was already laid out. Her hands moved faster than her thoughts.

The design came without hesitation. There were no references and no stencils. She didn't need them.

Lines mapped themselves beneath her fingers. A curl that echoed the vents. A triangular pulse gate. The wide sweep of overlapping detection loops surrounding the parlour, layered like muscle over bone. Her own shop. The bakery ruins. The crashed car with her old friends inside. Scaffolding was scattered across the street from their first hoard. Every building was rendered in ink and soft pulses of light.

She etched in the nodes and trap circuitry last. That was when she heard Mrs Eceer gasp. She still couldn't see beyond the design. Thin rings of glyphs glowed under her skin as she worked, feeding the design, tying it back to the living network outside.

Then it was over, and Tanya could see the world again through a haze.

Assistant leaned close and, for once, didn't write anything.

Mrs Eceer stood beside her, not looking away.

"It's not—it's not b—being summoned," Mrs Eceer stammered. She staggered backwards, and a little dot on the map moved too.

Assistant pointed with verve, and Tanya could hear its intention in her head. It moved!

There in the centre of Tanya's fine-line style map were three little dots, two larger and one smaller. As Tanya and Assistant moved around the shop to test, the map did too.

"What the actual fuck," Tanya breathed. "It really ain't being summoned. They're not supposed to do this, right? Right ?" She looked up at Mrs Eceer and Assistant, but neither of them had any response.

They all just stared for a minute longer.

"Well…shit…" Tanya said, her grin growing. "You really made a magic circuit board outta London."

"We did," Mrs Eceer corrected.

And Tanya knew Mrs Eceer wasn't just talking about the defences anymore.

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